Page 62 of All at Once

We lock eyes, and my entire body freezes. I don’t feel if my heart is beating particularly faster or slower. Oranyother feeling I could be sensing. It’s like time has stopped for a moment. The sudden fluttering in my chest only grows when he doesn’t look away first. I blink rapidly, as if removing myself from a daze, before turning my attention back to the conversation I was in.

I shake my head a couple times to regain my composure as if electricity didn’t just run through my body. “Oh right, I remember you mentioned a wedding before. When is it again?”

“Next week,” Enrique replies so casually, making me wonder how he didn’t notice my attention moved away like that a second ago.

There’s no time to think about this any further when he suggests we move closer to where the rest of their friends are. Where Lucaalsohappens to be sitting.

As we walk over, my hands start to shake again, this time more intensely. But with less nerves.More anticipation.

We sit down beside the rocks on the shore, when Enrique asks, “Do you guys want to have a movie night tomorrow?”

Luca nods. “I heard it’s going to rain tomorrow so that works great.”

“Is Sofia going to be there too?” I ask, looking over at Sofia, who’s sitting in the opposite corner with her friends at the moment.

“Yeah. I asked her before, and she said she’s pretty sure she’s free. So it would just be the four of us,” Enrique replies. “It hasn’t rained here in so long, so it’ll be nice.”

Before I know what’s happening, a guitar is being handed to Luca by one of his friends. He accepts it with a knowing smile and settles it on his lap. “Jasmine…,” he says, his voice startling me. More so his sudden mischievous tone.

“What?” I ask with a fluttering heart.

“Would you like me to serenade you?” he deadpans.

“My standards are pretty high so I’d save yourself the embarrassment,” I say, trying to sound unbothered, even though the question itself was the most romantic thing I’ve been asked before. Also wondering how many beers he had for such an unexpected question,only seeing one by his ankle.

Luca pretends to look offended as he covers his heart in shock. And somehow a lack of a verbal response makes me squirm evenmore.

“Don’t let him fool you,” Enrique says. “He’s actually pretty good on the guitar.”

Now I’m intrigued.

“You don’t say?” I tell Enrique, while glaring shrewdly back at Luca, who definitely looks more laid back than before.

Luca takes a deep breath before placing his fingers so seriously along the strings. The suspense keeps building until he actually plays his first note.

It’s probably the most out of tune sound I’veeverheard, to which his other friend immediately tugs the guitar away from him, while they both laugh into oblivion.

My chest fills with a warmth, noting how this almost resembles a moment that I could have experienced in college, foronce feeling a bit closer to those my age.No longer an outsider looking in through her imagination.

I must also be pretty tired when I look over my shoulder and don’t even seem to care how Clara has made her way into another conversation with Enrique.

The sound of the guitar gains my attention again.

Except this sounds waymore in tune than before.

Actually, it soundsreallypretty.

Luca’s playing a melody I can’t seem to recognize, yet it also sounds familiar at the same time.

“Guess the song,” he says, before glancing up at me in the blink of an eye, and then back to his guitar.

Freezing yet again, I wonder how long he realizes that I was watching him for.I hope not more than a few seconds.To be fair, it’s not my fault that he’s wearing his university sweatshirt that’s fitting him like skin.

As soon as he plays the first few notes, I hum along and answer, “‘Invisible String.’”

“Are you sure about that?” he challenges, narrowing his eyes at me cockily.

“If aFolkloresong plays, I recognize it,” I say confidently.

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